Let me just get this out of the way: being detained and interrogated by the United States Department of Homeland Security because said Department doesn’t find it ‘convincing’ that ‘mom blogging’ could be a ‘business’ (skeptical finger quotes courtesy United States Department of Homeland Security) that warrants travel to conferences is, no question, nothing compared to being sentenced to death by stoning and other horrors that befall women outside of North America. I understand this. I know this. But. BUT.

Being detained and interrogated for any reason is really, really scary. It just is. And when it requires one to defend one’s choice of profession and the legitimacy of one’s work and, really, the credibility of any enterprise involving one’s status as a mother, well, it undermines one’s confidence, and also makes one cry.